Checking a Fence Is Parallel
I remember a lad back in my teaching days, a bright enough boy, but he had this habit of cranking up the speed on a table saw whenever his cuts started wandering. He thought more power would force the wood into submission, but all he was doing was fighting the machine. The truth is, if […]
Folding Trestles for Occasional Work
You don’t need a workshop full of expensive, battery-operated jigs to figure out how to build a trestle. Most people think they need a table saw and a dust extractor just to get a decent workbench surface, but that’s a load of rubbish. I spent forty years on site seeing lads waste hours fighting with […]
A Freestanding Divider That Stays Put
Most people think that if you want to partition a space, you need to go out and buy a massive, expensive kit or drag a noisy circular saw across the floor for three hours. They think complexity is the same thing as quality. But I’ve spent forty years on site, and I can tell you […]
Three Stones and Nothing Else
I spent thirty years on site watching young lads buy these fancy, multi-stage diamond systems that cost more than a decent cordless drill, only to end up with an edge that still tears through timber like a blunt spoon. They think a high price tag solves everything, but they're just being sold a bit of […]
Buying From a Stall Without Regret
I remember standing at a rain-slicked market stall in Leeds back in '84, staring at a row of planes that looked like they’d been pulled from a shipwreck. Most people would’ve walked straight past, thinking they were just looking at rusted scrap, but I knew better. You can't judge a tool by its shine or […]
Machine Maintenance by the Month
I remember standing in the back of a college workshop back in the nineties, watching a lad try to force a dull jigsaw through a piece of seasoned oak. The machine was screaming, the wood was smoking, and the cut looked like it had been made by a drunk man with a hatchet. Most people […]
A Window Seat With Storage
I remember standing in a student’s workshop back in the late nineties, watching a lad struggle with a vibrating, battery-hungry circular saw, trying to force a straight line through some oak for a built-in bench. He was sweating, swearing, and the cut was as crooked as a dog's hind leg. He thought he needed more […]
Honing Guides Judged on Repeatability
I see these glossy magazine spreads and YouTube videos where someone spends twenty minutes talking about "precision engineering" and "ergonomic grips" before they've even put a blade in the thing. It’s nonsense. Most of those reviewers wouldn't know a consistent bevel if it bit them in the hand, and frankly, I'm tired of seeing people […]
The Jig You Made and Cannot Find
I spent thirty years on job sites and another ten in a classroom, and if there is one thing that gets under my skin, it’s the way modern woodworking shops are being sold. You go into a shop now and see people spending hundreds of pounds on fancy, plastic-moulded drawer systems and high-tech modular units […]
A Newel Post That Moves
You don't need to rip the whole staircase out or start buying expensive structural reinforcement kits just because that post has started to wobble. Most people see a shifting newel and think they need a heavy-duty drill or a massive amount of construction adhesive to fix it, but that's a mistake that'll only leave you […]